Stefan and Tweeters,This is an excellent find in Skamania County. There is only one other record of Pygmy Nuthatches in the county and that was from August 26, 2007. Wilson Cady
Columbia River Gorge, WA

---------- Original Message ----------
From: Stefan Schlick <greenfant at hotmail.com>
To: TWEETERS TWEETERS <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Tweeters] Drano Lake Pygmy Nuthatches (Skamania Co)
Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2014 22:48:32 -0500


I ended up in Skamania Co mid morning and had a pretty good day, finally reaching 125 for the county. My "knittle" (take the sum of the codes listed in www.wabirder.com for all your birds and divide it by the #species that you have for the county) for Skamania improved significantly with today's finds. :-) Franz Lake NWR is a miserable place when the sun is up in winter as access is already very difficult. Still, I found about 6 TRUMPETER SWANS mixed in with the Tundras. At Drano Lake east of Carson, it was windy and overcast. Halfway down the road to the Little White Salmon Fish Hatchery I pulled over to scope the ducks that had congregated in the inlet (about 25 Barrow's Goldeneyes) when I heard a familiar note uphill. I first heard then saw 3-4 PYGMY NUTHATCHES which is likely a highly uncommon bird for the area. Also within the flock was a WHITE-BREASTED NUTHATCH. A first-cycle THAYER'S GULL was among the about 15 Glaucous-winged and Olympic Gulls. 10+ Bald Eagles and several calling American Dippers near the fish hatchery rounded out the tally. It was very active. A Merlin was at the Spring Hill Fish Hatchery. On the way back on the OR side, I briefly checked for the Hood River Black-crowned Night-herons and found 6 birds (all adults) at the Nichols Boat Basin. Isn't this well worth a quick detour across the bridge, even for the WA state birder? Stefan SchlickHillsboro, OR